Does Heroes Need to be Saved?

A few weeks ago, Entertainment Weekly took the unprecedented step of running a cover story bemoaning the state of Heroes. Sagging ratings, labyrinthine plots, dozens of characters – the show is becoming unwieldy, and intimidating to new viewers. In what probably is a surprise to absolutely no one, I am an avid Heroes fan – in fact, with The Wire gone Battlestar Galactica is the only show on the air I enjoy more. (Speaking of The Wire, how bout both Marlo and Bubbles joining the ranks of the super-powered this season? Bubbles as Claire’s first prey a few weeks ago and Marlo as a big bad throughout the season? Awesome.) The cover story really goes to show you how passionate people are about this show – especially in the industry. Let’s face it – a show like this, on prime time network television, actually becoming a success? It flies in the face of a lot of conventional wisdom, and I am sure gives hope to a lot of industry folks tired of Dancing with the C-List Stars and CSI: Bakersfield dominating ratings. Sure, intelligent, well made, enthralling shows like Mad Men may get the awards, but a peek inside the Living section of any newspaper reveals an embarrassing mix of reality shows and formulaic procedurals dominating the ratings.

And that’s fine, really. People are, for the most part, pretty stupid. A show like Heroes is an anomaly. Those looking for more meaty fare can always go to HBO, Showtime, or even, who knew, AMC for quality programming. The problem with the article - which evidently was read with interest by NBC, who fired producers Jeph Loeb and Jesse Alexander upon its release – is that it really bashes a lot of the things that make Heroes great. In fact, after the last two episodes, "Villains" and "It’s Coming", (both of which can be watched online here), the whole article seems a little silly – the eps have been the highlight of the season. But the article did bring up some good points that, really more in the interest of keeping the show on the air than any creative issue, should be addressed.

A lot of the issues can be traced back to the writers’ strike. Last season a promising beginning really got shot to hell because of the need to truncate the story and wrap it up too soon. A lot of shows suffered from this, but with Heroes’ soap operatic nature, it really poses problems. As a result, the ending seemed forced, and a lot of the X-Men: Days of Future Past and God Loves, Man Kills inspired plots have seeped into this season, seeming repetitive. Maybe the writers just had a lot they wanted to say last season, and the abrupt ending left them with ideas they still wanted to explore. Who knows? EW is right in one respect, however – the confusing nature of the time travel plots is not only a barrier of entry for new viewers, it can get tired pretty quickly, especially if used as much as Heroes has. I have always hated the dues ex machine feel of plots resolved by time travel, and as much as I loved Days of Future Past, Heroes has seemed unwilling to fully commit in that direction, instead using the time travel willy-nilly for effect and shock value (Claire is a Villain! Peter has a scar! Sylar is a good guy!) more than anything else.

Hiro Nakamura is another issue EW has legitimate beef with. I really thought the guy has been irritating from day one, but scores of fans have loved him. Whatever appeal his naiveté may have offered at the beginning of the show has quickly turned into an embarrassing farce. Hiro’s scenes have become cringe worthy, and the promise of an actual character arc, the birth of hero type stuff we glimpsed with the appearance his badass samurai future self has been rendered null and void. That future never happened, remember? They have got to fix this. Maybe his brain scramble by Daddy Petrelli last week is a step in that direction – but if not, they need to kill him off. Immediately. And his annoying life partner Ando along with him. The sci-fi site i09 had an interesting take on it here – they claim the show itself has racist tendencies. The Asian men can’t be sexually mature heroes – they have to play second fiddle, or worse comic relief. Suresh spent the first two seasons as a whiny little bitch, but he finally gets laid and gets some mojo this season – now he is a villain. Hiro couldn’t get the princess last season, and continues to play the sexless clown. Interesting theory.

The main issue brought up by EW doesn’t really hold water, and that is the complexity of the show. Too many characters, too many plotlines, etc, etc. This, to me, is the strength of the show. The X-Men reference isn’t an accident – the show has taken many cues from Marvel’s mutants, and sheer volume and complexity has always been an X-Men trademark. History has shown us that these plots will be resolved eventually. Patience is required. (Really a lot of this beef stems from NBC. I have a friend who watches the show, and his wife complained loudly that all the teasers from week to week would promise some big reveal, some Shyamalanian twist – which, of course, was always a bit of a letdown – at least if the fervor of the ads were to be a barometer.) The last two weeks, we have seen all the disparate themes, characters, and plots this season brought together for what appears to be an imminent resolution to the “Villains” arc – albeit with a little ret conning last week. It wouldn’t be comics-inspired without the occasional ret con! The reason the show has gained a cult following is its embrace of these multiple storylines, characters, and plots. It is what separates the show from your run of the mill, simplistic trash populating the rest of network television. I am not saying Heroes is The Sopranos or Battlestar, but for a genre network show, the audience is challenged on a regular basis. They have their bows to banality – i.e. Hiro Nakamura – but overall, it is top notch fantasy, deserving of a larger audience. Or at least a little more rope from NBC.